Tom McAuley (MSc. P.Eng., PhD cand.)

Saint Paul University, Ottawa, Canada

Lonergan-on-the-edge Marquette University, Milwaukee, WI

Sept.11-12, 2015

A Global Water Crisis and Water Ethics under Development: How Can Bernard

Lonergan Help?

Water  is  cross-­‐cutting,  multidisciplinary  Water  and…  

•  Human  health  •  Agriculture  •  Ecosystem  health  •  Energy  •  Industry  •  Conflict  •  Collaboration  •  Religions,  spirituality  •  Civilisation  

WATER  is  essential  for  life        ‘sine  qua  non’  and  ‘sui  generis’  

WORLD  WATER  CRISIS  •  Global  threats  to  human  water  security  and  river  biodiversity  

Biodiversity •  65% of continental discharge

threatened (mod.-high) •  Globally, freshwater

biodiversity has declined 35% since 1970” WWF

Human Water Security •  “nearly 80% of humanity

exposed to high levels of threat •  water security is essential to

global food security •  2/3 of world’s largest

groundwater aquifers in decline (2015)

WATER  INFRASTRUCTURE  

•  845,000  dams  in  world  (2009)  •  Municipal  &  rural  water  systems  •  Agriculture  –  70%  of  freshwater  use    

Water  poverty  •  870  million  persons  lack  proper  access  to  decent  

clean  potable  water    •  2.5  billion  persons  lacking  sanitation  

Water Decision-making

Main  Actors  -­‐  Governments  -­‐  national  to  local  -­‐  mandated  bodies/commissions  -­‐  EU,  UN,    -­‐  NGO’s    -­‐  MNCs  e.g.  Bechtel,  Enron,  Vivendi  

Water  Governance  •  range  of  political,  social,  economic  and  administrative  

systems  for  developing  and  managing  water  resources,  and  the  delivery  of  water  services  

Water  Management  –  subset  of  WG,  sometimes  synonymous  

Example: “The US Bureau of Reclamation began releases of water into California’s Klamath River on Friday in order to prevent a large fish kill. The releases will continue into September. Last year, farmers unhappy about sharing their irrigation water with the river’s salmon took legal action to try to prevent releases, and were unsuccessful.” New York Times (Aug.24, 2015)

Integrated  Water  Resources  Management  (IWRM)    o   a  principal  global  water  management  standard  o  vs.  conventional  (top-­‐down)  state  hydraulic  paradigm  

“a process which promotes the coordinated development and management of water, land and related resources in order to maximize the resultant economic and social welfare in an equitable manner without compromising the sustainability of vital ecosystems.”

GLOBAL WATER PARTNERSHIP, 2000

“Engaging the ethical dimension of water governance requires very different processes than suggested by IWRM and other water “reforms” espoused within the water resources community.” Ingram, 2008.

“a new disposition toward ‘‘integration’’ must include the contextual and political specificities of different cultural orientations”

(Schmidt 2012, Akpablo 2011)

IWRM has been critiqued o  How to deal with competing interests? o  Implicit values of the managers? o  What about cultural\religious histories of different

peoples, and their values?

SOCIAL ETHICS

ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS

WATER ETHICS

Literature  mostly  since  ~2000  •  Most  highlight  concerns  •  Propose  big-­‐picture  guiding  principles  •  Plurality  of  approaches  •  Philosophical  background  usually  implicit  

Water  Ethics  as  developing  

A  few  titles:  Ø  The  Missing  Piece:  A  Water  Ethic  (2008)  Ø  Troubled  Waters:  Religion,  Ethics,  and  the  Global  Water  Crisis  (2008)  Ø  Water  ethics:  foundational  readings  for  students  and  professionals  (2010)  Ø  Water  Ethics  -­‐  A  Values  Approach  to  Solving  the  Water  Crisis  (2013)  Ø  Just  Water:  Theology,  Ethics,  and  the  Global  Water  Crisis  (2014)  Ø  Laudato  Si’,  recent  CST  (2003+)  

Approaches Questions/concern Inadvertance ‘From knowledge to action.’ Utilitarianism Aggregated utility in terms of economic welfare

and consumption (now and in future)? Liberal equality

What about equality (now and in future) and human rights?

Social contract and discourse

What are just conditions and procedures to arrive at water-related decisions?

Priority, threshold:

How does water management affect the poor, the excluded? Native peoples?

Feminist Use of power and roles of men and women Biocentric How does human water use affect other species

and ecosystems (now and in future)? Theocentic How to steward God’s creation? Pragmatism What works to solve problematic situations?

Combinations of the above as suited

Water  Ethics  –  many  perspectives  

1.  “How  could  a  water  ethic  respect  value  differences  among  individuals,  groups,  and  societies?”  

 

2.  What  would  be  an  appropriate  scale  for  such  an  ethic?    Priscoli JD, Dooge J, Llamas R. Water and Ethics: Overview. Paris: UNESCO; 2004

Water  Ethics  -­‐  difficult  questions  remain    

2004

“we  do  not  claim  there  is  a  single,  unified  water  ethics  discourse  but  instead  use  the  term  to  reflect  an  array  of  interdisciplinary  reflections…  worries,  and  principles.    Our  suggestion  is  that  there  are  always  multiple  normative  frameworks  in  play:  water  ethics  are  inherently  plural.”    

Schmidt and Peppard, (2014)

2014

Part  2  

How  to  apply  Lonergan?  

What  is  the  major  source  of  confusion    in  water  ethics?    Is  it    •  the  intersection  of  science  and  values?  •  lack  of  a  reliable  transdisciplinary  methodology?  •  the  transcultural  aspect?  •  non-­‐systematic  blends  of  moral  principles  and  philosophies?  •  implicit  and  confused  epistemologies?  •  the  exclusion  of  any  role  for  human  intentionality    •  Neglect  of  the  subject  re.  subject/object  referrant?  

 

Help  from  Lonergan  to  turn  to:  •  a  higher  level  of  organization  and  integration  

To  the  conscious  intentional  human  subject  •  structure  of  intentionality    

o  underlies  all  communication  o  all  knowing  and  doing  

Ethics  of  the  developing  Subject  •  ‘An  existential  ethics’    •  ‘an  empiric  and  critical  ethics  of  the  incarnate  developing  subject’  

•  ‘An  ethic  of  personal  responsibility’  

o  Ethos  as  subject’s  grounded  existential  orientation  

•  authenticity  in  3-­‐fold  self-­‐transcendence    –  Cognitive,  Affective,  Moral  

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Values

Personal Religious

Cultural

Social

Vital

Ethical  deliberation  applied  to  water  decisions  

The Human Good

Value

ecohydrosocial system

Particular water uses

•  A  process  of  collaborative  inquiry  •  Driven  by  questions  •  Unfolding  through  all  relevant  human-­‐water  interactions

\patterns  of  collaboration\ecologies  

 Questions and discussion.  

Tom McAuley (PhD cand.)